Catholic Hospital Argues Fetuses Are Not People In Malpractice Suit

The lead defendant in the case is Catholic Health Initiatives, the Englewood-based nonprofit that runs St. Thomas More Hospital as well as roughly 170 other health facilities in 17 states. Last year, the hospital chain reported national assets of $15 billion. The organization’s mission, according to its promotional literature, is to “nurture the healing ministry of the Church” and to be guided by “fidelity to the Gospel.” Toward those ends, Catholic Health facilities seek to follow the Ethical and Religious Directives of the Catholic Church authored by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Those rules have stirred controversy for decades, mainly for forbidding non-natural birth control and abortions. “Catholic health care ministry witnesses to the sanctity of life ‘from the moment of conception until death,’” the directives state. “The Church’s defense of life encompasses the unborn.”

The directives can complicate business deals for Catholic Health, as they can for other Catholic health care providers, partly by spurring political resistance. In 2011, the Kentucky attorney general and governor nixed a plan in which Catholic Health sought to merge with and ultimately gain control of publicly funded hospitals in Louisville. The officials were reacting to citizen concerns that access to reproductive and end-of-life services would be curtailed. According to The Denver Post, similar fears slowed the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth’s plan over the last few years to buy out Exempla Lutheran Medical Center and Exempla Good Samaritan Medical Center in the Denver metro area.

But when it came to mounting a defense in the Stodghill case, Catholic Health’s lawyers effectively turned the Church directives on their head. Catholic organizations have for decades fought to change federal and state laws that fail to protect “unborn persons,” and Catholic Health’s lawyers in this case had the chance to set precedent bolstering anti-abortion legal arguments. Instead, they are arguing state law protects doctors from liability concerning unborn fetuses on grounds that those fetuses are not persons with legal rights

3. Soooooo...let me get this straight.

When a woman is, for whatever reason, seeking to exercise her currently legal right to terminate her pregnancy - she can't go to St. Thomas More Hospital because once she walks in the door...in the view of that hospital...her fetus takes on a life of its own.

When a woman has been admitted to that same hospital expecting to go home in a day or two with a newborn baby (twins in this case?) and, as a result of the negligence/incompetence of that same hospital, she ends having to deal with their death...that's ok because why???

WTF - the fetus only takes on a life of its own based on the woman's "intention". Sheesh.

It will be great to see the duplicity of the the anti-choice position laid out in this one.

7. Yep, that about sums it up.

So, like if the woman wanted to terminate the pregnancy, her intention is "wrong" so therefore the fetus becomes a person, but if the woman intends to maintain the pregnancy, then the fetus is NOT a person.

23. Close ...

When a woman is, for whatever reason, seeking to exercise her currently legal right to terminate her pregnancy - she can't go to St. Thomas More Hospital because once she walks in the door...in the view of that hospital...her fetus takes on a life of its own. When a woman has been admitted to that same hospital expecting to go home in a day or two with a newborn baby (twins in this case?) and, as a result of the negligence/incompetence of that same hospital, she ends having to deal with their death...that's ok because why???

All of that is correct; but let's go further:

When a woman seeks the CONTRACEPTION that would prevent the need to lawfully terminate her pregnacy, she can't because, according to this same church, her fetus takes on a life of its own at the point of PRE-conception.

29. I do have a belief system

It's that there is no supernatural anything. It's that the universe and all that is in it is natural and obeys the laws of physics.
This eliminates tons of chaff! Ghosts, spirits, demons, gods, afterlives, angels, fairies, Santa, the Easter Bunny.....

My life is fine without all that stuff some caveman made up in prehistory. So liberating!

8. Gee, morals are changeable if there's money involved. Typical of the Right.

18. yeah. OR, "We only believe in it when it works in our favor."

Fuckers. (And I'm Catholic.) I want to know what IDIOT of a Cannon Lawyer signed off on this argument...
Not that I wish them well in this, far from it. But if I were that guy's boss, and THAT'S the argument he came up with for winning this case, I'd fire his ass. Thomas Moore, these guys AIN'T.

10. New Years day and the on-call obstetrician never answered her page

Those seven-month old babies most certainly could have been saved but instead, they suffocated along with the mother because Dr. Pelham Staples didn't respond to her page.

I didn't find anything in the NY Wrongful Death Act online that referred to unborn children, but this is from Illinois.

(740 ILCS 180/2.2) (from Ch. 70, par. 2.2)
Sec. 2.2. The state of gestation or development of a human being when an injury is caused, when an injury takes effect, or at death, shall not foreclose maintenance of any cause of action under the law of this State arising from the death of a human being caused by wrongful act, neglect or default. There shall be no cause of action against a physician or a medical institution for the wrongful death of a fetus caused by an abortion where the abortion was permitted by law and the requisite consent was lawfully given. Provided, however, that a cause of action is not prohibited where the fetus is live-born but subsequently dies.
There shall be no cause of action against a physician or a medical institution for the wrongful death of a fetus based on the alleged misconduct of the physician or medical institution where the defendant did not know and, under the applicable standard of good medical care, had no medical reason to know of the pregnancy of the mother of the fetus. (Source: P.A. 81-946.)

21. The hypocrisy of the elite. nt

25. Not religion or even money, but it is the elite mindset

Somehow there are two sets of people, the elite and the not-elite. Money has an influence, but it isn't the determining factor. Religion is used and abused at all levels, but again, religion isn't the determining factor.

15. Wait, I thought the fetus is a child until it's born..

after being born, it's only a child if the parents have means or, if it's a Catholic child, only if the parrish priest is a pedophile. I'm sure I read this somewhere in Scalia's or Thomas' sage decisions, or maybe I just dreamed they said it. Thomas spoke the other day, isn't that what he said? I'm really just so fucking confused right now.

20. So when it saves them money

all of a sudden the fetus is just a fetus and not a person with rights? That figures.

on edit: Will the "person-hood" people notice it's a bad idea giving person-hood to fetus' - it's bad for business...of course that is the break in their party...the crackpots vs. the money ...GET IT PAUL RYAN...THE FINANCE WONK?